Sexy curves, clothes hangers and dressing for big “gala” occasions

First of all I’d like to thank all of you for reading the blog even though I hardly published any articles in 2011. However, as much as I’m still keen on brafitting and new bra collections, my lingerie needs are now fullfilled in 99% by Ewa Michalak. I may admire new Freyas, Curvy Kates, Masquerades or Bravissimo line, but when I finally get to order anything new it turns up to fit and shape much worse than Effuniak’s plunges and CH half cups (which are a marvel for the breasts). I see that the growing lingerie blogging community is also starting to appreciate this Polish brand, as well as another pro-boob company from Poland – BiuBiu (which I also love).

Dressing a curvy woman is a challange, isn’t it? There are not so many companies that cater for the needs of hourglass shaped women. We have Bravissimo – now Pepperberry, BiuBiu. I remember Mauzonka of Balkonetka once wrote about Bratique Helene… (but unless you have a very conservative taste in clothing and don’t want to look like your own grandmother I don’t really recommend it).  Georgina of Fullerfigerfullerbust mentions several brands, like PinUp Girl clothing (btw, Georgina, those dresses are really nice) or Simply Be. Brittany of Thin and Curvy likes Trashy Diva… But what made me think about writing this note is actually this article. It’s not a recent one, mind you (which just shows how long I have been sitting on it). Sooo, the world’s sexiest woman had to BEG for a gown – because designers think she’s too curvy… IMHO, this just shows how crazy and gain oriented the fashion world is. Obviously designing and making clothes that would fit real women, not half-starved waif looking fashion models is a challenge, you do have to put all those seams, God knows how many darts in various places, which is awfully difficult… To me it looks like those great names of fashion reputed to be great designers and taylors apparently are not capable of making a dress, or a shirt, whatever to accommodate feminine curves… and it doesn’t only refer to gala glamorous dresses. Just out of curiosity, once I dropped into Escada shop on one of the main avenues of Lisbon and decided to try on a dress… Just an everyday casual dress, nothing fancy. Obviously my boobs didn’t fit into a 40 or 42, and 44 was not available. Anyway, even 42 looked like a sack of potatoes on me… And for this I was supposed to pay over 500 euros… if I were stupid enough to buy it…

So, the point of this note is, we do already have some clothes for everyday wear, more or less casual or even formal occasions. But what about really BIG events when a glamorous gown like the one Christina Hendricks is wearing on the photograph IS absolutely necessary? Her example shows that we can’t really count on big designers (even if any of us could afford to throw several thousand bucks for a dress to wear only once). Well, what do you do then ladies? Are there any companies that make gala gowns or do we have to resort to having taylored them to our size individually?

2011 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 50,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 19 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Soutienocracia is already online

Hello, everybody.

I’d just like to say that my bra-shop is already operational. Anybody who speaks or understands Portuguese is welcome: www.soutienocracia.com

What I have in stock now is some part of the Curvy Kate spring collection, and also Ewa Michalak bras. Actually, you’ll be able to buy them all, it’s just that for some models the delivery time will be longer….  (Sorry, didn’t rob a bank which I would have had to do to have all the models in all the possible sizes from Ewa:P

I’ll just repeat the address one more time: www.soutienocracia.com

 

Soutienocracia is already open

I would like to invite everybody to my shop which is already open.  I received the first shipment of bras – 5 models from spring/summer collection of Curvy Kate. Princess in beige and pink, Emily in black and tourquise, Tease me in black/almond. I’m still waiting to receive a coral Thrill me and Elegance in ivory, but they should be here on Friday at the latest. So, at the moment and have almost 76 sizes in stock, and I’m going to have more after I receive Effuniaks.

How to buy from me? Anybody here from Braga, Portugal? Yup, the shop is located there, at the moment in my house:) Sorry for not having a proper stationary store, but I simply prefer to invest money into stock to give you more choice rather than  pay the rent and the cost of furnishing it and also employing somebody to help me (however I know that I won’t be able to escape this “fate” in the future). So anybody living in Braga(land) can come and try on bras and of course buy them:) In order to do it  it’s advisable to make an appointment by calling 91 020 3194 or writing to soutienocracia@gmail.com , I’m sure you can understand why it’s better to do it… Apart from all sizes of bras I guarantee additional attractions – namely 5 feline ones. Eeeeverybody loves them. But if you’re allergic, just notify me about it in advance, I will isolate the cats and air the “shop room”.

The other way of selling I’m offering is  a “bra-home-party” at a customer’s apartment. We simply arrange a date that is conveniant for both of us and you  invite a few of your girlfriends (and/or female members of your family) to your home for coffee and gossip, I come too with a big suitcase or two full of bras. There we sit, chat, you try on bras (and buy them of course) and we generally have a good time. As far as the number of women at the event is concerned, well, as they say – the more the merrier:) However,  more women to fit into a good size of a bra means more time that the party will take. The optimum number is 10, more or less.  It’s also advisable to provide me with the frame and bust measurements of the participants. Unfortunately all the bras that I will have in stock won’t fit into 2 suitcases, I would need several more… So we need to limit the number of lingerie to be carried to the event to the general area of the size that should fit you. Inside Braga this type of service is free, outside I have to ask you to cover the cost of relocating to the event. I suppose, after dividing the cost of it into 10 people it will be less the the shipping…

And finally Soutiencracia is going to sell online. The website is under construction, it should be ready more or less in March… 

Ps. Come to my Soutienocracia Facebook profile too.

From 80C to 70H or why most women still wear bad bra sizes?

Recently when I was browsing through my old photographs I came across one that gave me an idea for this note (and also another one for the other blog). The photo shows me wearing one of my old bras from the times when I wasn’t bra-conscious plus a top (of course:) ). As I still had access to that old top a decided to make another photo, this time in a well fitted bra just to see the difference. Here’s the result:

The old bra is a 80C(36C) from Victoria’s Secret (yes, I used to think that this brand was a bra paradise), the bra that I wear on the right photograph is an Effuniak 70H(32H). There is a difference, isn’t there? And I must say that the old photograph shows me when I was actually 2 kg less than now… And still, a well fitted bra makes me optically lose even more than these two kilos….

And the bad effect you see above is an everyday bread to a lot of women. Big brands as VS, and also media showing incorrect women’s body image are the culprits who force women into believing that a look shown on the pics below is ok.

 

And mind you, these are photos from VS fashion show, where not everything may happen to be fitted correctly. Even Panache happens to dress their models into bad sizes as kasica shows here. However it seems that VS should learn a lot from Panache about fitting models into lingerie. Other films made by kasica at the shows of spring/summer collection  don’t show too many examples  of bad fit as the one with Masquerade. Victoria’s Secret’s website and catalogues show that they don’t have an idea about how a bra should fit  too. Have a look at some of photos from their website:

Really, a ton of examples of badly fitted bras. And they make the same errors as they did on their show(s) – too wide bands for all these slim girls and too small cups. The problem is that  VS is not the only one providing examples of bad fit for the public.  The internet is full of images of celebs, models and also ordinary women wearing incorrectly fitted lingerie (or clothes that don’t allow enough space for the breasts).

 The garments that the girls above are wearing on their breast can be only called nipple covers… These pieces of cloths don’t deserve the name of a bra.

I must say it seems like a constant fight… To convince all women that don’t know their correct size yet and believe that what they get from big brands is ok…

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

About 3 million people visit the Taj Mahal every year. This blog was viewed about 31,000 times in 2010. If it were the Taj Mahal, it would take about 4 days for that many people to see it.

In 2010, there were 28 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 35 posts. There were 69 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 50mb. That’s about 1 pictures per week.

The busiest day of the year was November 23rd with 225 views. The most popular post that day was What does it mean to wear D or DD cups?.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were busenfreundinnen.net, forum.gazeta.pl, forum.miau.pl, facebook.com, and eternalvoyageur.xanga.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for gigantomastia, macromastia, 32f, curvy kate, and bfcidade.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

What does it mean to wear D or DD cups? April 2010
2 comments

2

G and GG cups – do they always stand for “get a reduction”? February 2010
7 comments

3

Plastic surgery – is it worth the bother? July 2010
8 comments

4

Boob-friendly swimwear May 2010
4 comments

5

What has a correct bra size given to me? February 2010
9 comments

Panthers and vivid coloured half-cups

To begin with I’d like to say sorry for not writing for quite a long time and thank you for coming here and reading my blog even though nothing appeared here since last article about Balkonetka’s catalogue. I’m preparing to open a lingerie shop here in Portugal and I already started another blog to advertise it and also to present the brands that produce full range of sizes. You may have noticed a new link has appeared – Soutienocracia. Yes, it’s the other blog of mine:) However I can’t blame Soutienocracia and lack of time for not writing here – unfortunately it’s also my laziness and addiction to Plants vs Zombies game (which eats up a lot of my free time):P

Today I’d like to return to the Polish brand of Effuniak. It’s one of the brands that I’d like to sell here so I follow what goes on on Ewa’s website quite thouroughly and I also keep on buying some of the bras – just to test them on my breasts etc (I have to know what I’m going to sell, don’t I). At this moment I have to state these are the best constructed bras on the whole market, they just do miracles with the boobs. Mine and not only mine just look spectacular in Effuniaks . You can see that in the Balkonetka’s catalogue. You can also see that recently Ewa did a pre-Christmas suprise to everybody and introduced quite a lot of styles – padded halfcups in black, fuchsia, tourquise, powder pink and red (and complimentary line of plunges in the same colours in bigger cups – apart from powder pink). One more recent novelty is a padded halfcup in glossy cobalt. The latter already has a review on Bramania by kasica_k – a very positive one actually. Kasica’s delighted with it. And you? What do you think about it? The feedback in the commentaries on Stanikomania as well as on Balkonetka (70E , 70D, 70G, 70B)  is kind of mixed. The bra raises very extreme emotions. From the ones of love and delight about the style, fabric, colour and those wide straps, through the ones saying the bra woud fantasic if it wasn’t for for the colour to the ones hating those wide straps as well as the colour. However nobody denies the lifting effect it does to the boobs…

I would like to review collectively 4 more Effuniaks that I bought recently. Two plunges – red panther, black panther (both in 70H) and two plunges – a fuchsia and a tourquise in 75GG.

Here, links to Balkonetka users showing these bras:

red panther: 70C,  70H, 65FF

black panther: 70GG, 65F

fuchsia half cup: 65A, 75GG

tourquoise half cup: 75GG, 65C

FIT

I must say Effuniak produces real back sizes. In most cases taking your British back size is not recommendable. I took these two panthers in 70 and they are real boa constrictors. I would probably be much better off in a 75 in these two models, however as I ordered online and spent quite a lot of time waiting for my sizes to be sewn and then sent to me I decided to keep them. Extenders do exists:P

As far as half cups are concerned I was in Poland when I bought the fuchsia one so I could try it on. Dark half cups are the same boa constrictors as the plunges, for my 73cm of frame measurement a 75 was enough.

The cup size, in my opinion, is standard. I bought the cup size I always take from Ewa – in case of a 70 band it’s an H and GG with a 75 back size.

SHAPE AND UPLIFT

Ewa’s plunges give a shape and uplift that is an absolute mastership of the world. She should be given a Nobel prize for that construction. Half-cups give a shape that resembles more “apples in a basket” image instead of “breast on a tray” effect. Some may say that both of these are indecent… Well, I prefer to be indecent in Effuniaks rather than have my boobs squeezed and unsupported by bras that I would be fitted into in most of the shops.

BEAUTY

Well, as they say the beauty is in the eye of the beholder or you don’t discuss taste… I like wild animal prints as well as bold, deep colours. But I know for sure there are women who don’t apreciate such designs… If we all liked the same things the world would be very boring, wouldn’t it? I give a 5 out 5 mark both to the panthers and to the half cups.

COMFORT

I don’t remember if I mentioned it previously, Effuniaks came high in Bramania’s survey for “the most comfortable bra”. In case of these 4 models I agree too. The half cups are very comfy to wear. The plunges do need an extenter, but once I use it it’s fine, nothing digs in or tries to drill a hole in the sternum or armpits. No discomfort from staps either. The breasts are supported, in fact it’s almost like a luxerious holiday in a spa for them – they just lie in the cups and don’t have to do anything else but look nice. And they almost protest when I take the bra off…